“Death penalty threatens for LGBTQ people in Brunei from next week on”

In the tiny Asian oil state Brunei, on Borneo, the death penalty for gays threatens from next week on. According to human rights organization Amnesty, new, strict … legislation will enter into force in the country on 3 April. With this, people who have sex with someone of the same sex can be stoned to death. And for people who steal something, in the worst case, amputation of a body part threatens. This also applies to children.

The penalties are in new sections of Brunei’s sharia law …

‘Sharia law’ is not by any means something monolithic, something uniform all over the Muslim world. Like, eg, the Bible and the Bhagavad Gita, the Quran is a religious book, not a legal book. There are different schools of thought among Muslim legal scholars.

Amnesty reacts furiously. “To introduce such cruel and inhumane punishments is in itself terrible”, says a Brunei investigator of the human rights organization. She adds that Brunei should not even see some cases as crimes. “Including sex with someone of the same sex. Brunei must immediately stop their plans for these penalties.” …

Sharia was planned to be introduced in three phases: the first part contained fines for, eg, extra-marital pregnancy or not praying on Friday. Under heavy international pressure, the country did not continue with the introduction of the other two phases, but now Brunei intends to do so. …

Brunei is a former British colony and retains very close links with this country. Since the handover of Hong Kong in 1997, Brunei hosts the only remaining British military base in the Far East: here.

To make a long story short: the absolute monarch is Brunei is a staunch ally of the British empire … err … Commonwealth, of NATO, and of the Western ‘free world’.

Apparently, it is very possible to be both a close buddy of the Western ‘free world’, and to ban Christmas.

The NOS article continues:

“Sultan lived as a playboy”

Observers see the age of the sultan as a possible cause for the stricter religious rules. “He is getting a little older and would therefore try to collect some points to end up in heaven despite all his sins”, says correspondent Michel Maas.

The sultan has a past that is difficult to reconcile with his current piety. Together with his brother Jefri, he lived for years as a playboy and wasted billions of dollars.

They bought jets and other planes that they filled with polo horses or with models and actresses whom they flew in from all over the world and rewarded richly. “Jefri had a yacht called ‘Tits’ and the two speed boats on board were called ‘Nipple 1’ and ‘Nipple 2′”, says Maas.

Fortune has shrunk considerably

The extravagant lifestyle of the two came to light when the sultan deposed Jefri as finance minister, because he allegedly stole 13 billion euros. Jefri, in turn, sued some of his British lawyers who allegedly had misled him. Maas: “During the trial all the dirty details of the playboy brothers were discussed, much to the delight of the British tabloids.”

The brothers had wasted tens of billions of euros in twenty years. In the 1990s, the sultan was forced to take things a bit easier. All his income came from oil, of which the mini-state had more than enough for decades. But now the fortune of the sultan has shrunk considerably and the end of the large oil field of Brunei is coming into view.